


Clip my wings an make me human

by Lilmoka



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Always a girl, Angst, Depression, Fix-it fic, Gen, Joan Watson - Freeform, Post Reichenbach, girl!John Watson - Freeform, girl!Sherlock Holmes - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-11
Updated: 2012-03-11
Packaged: 2017-11-01 19:28:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/360403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilmoka/pseuds/Lilmoka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How Joan deals with Sherlock's death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clip my wings an make me human

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for The Reichenbach Fall.

Joan doesn't hate her therapist. She really doesn't. She thinks the woman is kind of brilliant, very clever and painfully good at her job. But at the same time, she's always asking for details, telling Joan to "share her feelings" and, well. Joan can't do that. The memories she's asked are too painful to revisit. She can't open with her doctor. She doesn't want to, because she's afraid of what she'd find.  
Joan is a murderer. Yes, she's a soldier and yes, she just obeyed her superiors, but that doesn't justify the fact that she killed people for a living. 

"Afghanistan is gorgeous". That's the first thing someone told her when they heard she fought there. Joan wanted to punch them in the face. She wanted to scream, to tell this person (Harry's friend, possibly) that she didn't go to Afghanistan because she wanted it. She was sent there and she was told to kill. She didn't use her medical degree to help, it was not useful: her work was to patch up soldiers and send them to the front lines again, to die.  
She fought. She fought everyday not to be overtaken by her task but at night, when the cruel sun was down and the only light came from too close explosions, she felt her hands shaking, she heard the moans and cries of those she couldn't save, every single one of them, and weeped. 

Joan is good at pretending. Short soft hair, plain face, barely there smile, no one will look at her a second time. A normal girl, they would think, if they ever remembered seeing her. A broken now-ex soldier with a dark look, that's how she sees herself. She always thought that the war broke something inside of her, like a part of her soul. She thought she was unfixable.  
That is, until Sherlock walked into her life. 

Sherlock is terribly hard to describe. Joan has tried countless times to do so, but she wasn't able to do her friend justice. Sherlock is a mad woman. Her faithful companion is a skull, she thinks of her brother as a nemesis and she's a genius. Joan adores her. 

There are days when she hates Sherlock, too. It's not easy living with a flatmate that will shoot the wall out of boredom. And she's an addicted, too, which makes Joan cringe. She's a doctor, for fuck's sake, she should be helping her friend, not indulging her!  
At the same time, she doesn't feel like judging Sherlock too hard. Joan is an addicted, in her on way, and Sherlock is her pusher. The way Sherlock smiles when saying "There will be danger" should be a crime. Joan can't possibly resist those eyes sparkling with mischief. 

Sherlock can be very much like a baby, to Joan's horror and eternal amusement. She will refuse to get up and shower for days, unless Joan makes her. She will complain loudly about the latest soap plot turn (Boring!) and gleefully spoil Joan of what will happen next. She will steal the phone from Joan's pocket or, even better, demand Joan sends a text for her. She will use her sarcasm and wits to outsmart others when in company of people she doesn't like (Anderson) and mock her brother for being out of shape.  
And, as many babies do, she needs someone to take care of her. Joan can do that. She's secretly grateful for the opportunity to do so, thought Sherlock probably knows it. Sherlock knows everything. 

Joan often has nightmares. She sees the desert in her dreams and white eyed bodies and her hands are always soaked in blood. She remembers each of them vividly and no amount of pretending can help her feel normal. Sometimes distraction techniques work. Chasing a serial killer, solving mysteries and causing trouble, not one of these things would work without the key element: Sherlock. Sherlock and her madness, dark curls in the wind, omnipresent scarf even in summer, Sherlock, Sherlock, Sherlock. 

Sherlock is everywhere. Sherlock is Joan's lifesaver. Sherlock is the only way she can cope. Sherlock is what keeps her grounded, sane(ish) and even makes her feel happy. Joan didn't realise how much she was dependent on Sherlock until she died. Right in that moment, she would have swore her heart was shattering. She curls up alone on the couch for days, after _that thing_. She doesn't eat, doesn't answer her phone, doesn't even think. How can she go on with her life when her best, the person she cared most about, who she considered part of her family is gone?  
(she can't bring herself to say the other word. she may be able to say it in time, but at the moment she can't even begin to comprehend what's happening, let alone name it) 

She talks to Sherlock's tombstone. Of course she does, she's crazy. Or, well, if she's not, she's getting there. She could swear Sherlock is still alive, but that's all in her head. No one could survive that fall and Joan is a doctor, she knows what thirty meters can do to the human body. And yet, her mind refuses to cooperate. She'll see a Sherlock-like shape at Tesco, in the fruit aisle, but it will disappear after a moment. She will run in circles, tracing a scent that's so unmistakably Sherlock it must her... Except it's not. It's never Sherlock, no matter how hard she tries to find her. 

In all this madness, the person who helps her more than anyone is Molly. Joan has never really been friends with her, but after Sherlock's... After what happened to Sherlock they started talking and discovered they have some things in common. They both adore Sherlock, for once. They bonded over her brilliance, smiling fondly when remembering their best friend.  
Soon, they go from acquaintances to friends, to the point that Joan starts spending her time with Moll while she's working at the lab. She doesn't do much, Molly is more than able at her work, but after a while she stops staring at her friend and decides to help her. Molly does the autopsies and Joan write the reports, sometimes tidies up and often forbids to Molly to do any more work until she has eaten something (a lot like with Sherlock, strangely, Joan finds herself thinking). 

Lestrade doesn't call much these days. He tried to talk to Joan once or twice, even jokingly promising she could examine the body, but Joan burst into tears and Ms. Hudson shooed the DI out of the house, scolding him.  
She doesn't see the rest of the team and Joan is entirely too grateful for it. Harry always told her she's an unforgiving bastard, and maybe she's right, but Joan can't deal with Donovan and Anderson, not right now. Possibly, not ever. 

Joan doesn't get back to her therapist, which earns her a lot of worried looks from Ms. Hudson, but she starts going out more often. Mostly at work and at Molly's flat, but it's a progress. She even manages not to spit on Mycroft's face when he shows up at her door one night, claiming that his sister wouldn't want to see her in that state. Joan does not spit on him, but she does punch his nose. She feels a thrill of satisfaction, watching his expensive clothes soak with blood. She tells Molly the next day and they share a laugh, after Molly makes sure Joan didn't injure her hand. 

Time passes slowly, every day becomes a little less painful. In the mornings, Joan wakes up, showers, prepares two mugs of tea and then remembers that Sherlock isn't there to drink hers. She often ends up drinking both, only to complain loudly about her bladder later in the day.  
She doesn't stop working at the hospital, but she doesn't spend more time there, even if she now has "all this time to waste", as Sarah informed her. To be honest, Sarah looked like a deer in headlights after she uttered those words and immediately started to apologise, but Joan didn't take it well. She didn't go to the hospital for a week after that little accident and she probably wouldn't have gone for a long time if Ms. Hudson hadn't convinced her to. Sarah said she was sorry, again, and Joan forgave her, because that's what friends do. 

There are days when getting up is impossible. When she wants to hide under the covers and maybe go into hibernation. When she can't stop crying, not even when her throat burns and her eyes become dry. When she contemplates her gun, weighting her options. When she hurts so much she can't stand it. When she dreams of Sherlock and waking up to the harsh reality is too much.  
On those days, Ms. Hudson will come up and bring her lemon tea, her favourite, and jam toasts. Molly will send her a funny picture of her cat. Sarah will come by at noon, sometimes trying to drag her out of the bed, other times curling up next to her and letting Joan's tears soak her shirt.  
Once, when Joan is feeling particularly upset, Molly and Sarah take her to the cinema to watch a cheesy romantic comedy, feeding her popcorns and silly jokes until the three of them get kicked out of the theatre. It's fun, even if it takes Joan a while to realise it. 

For a while, just after Sherlock's dead, Joan wonders if joining the army again. She needs the action, the thrill of the chase, but she knows she won't find them as exhilarating, now that Sherlock isn't with her anymore. She keeps training thought, cleaning her gun daily and going to the shooting range once a week. For hand to hand fights she prefers pubs; there's always some bloke who drinks too much and tries grabbing her. She puts them to their place. 

She has to stop sleeping with her gun under the pillow after the third night in a row she wakes up to Sherlock's fall, brandishing the gun as if to kill the memory. Those are also the only moments she wishes Moriarty was still alive, just to kill him herself, possibly after showing him all the torture methods she'd learned in the army. She doesn't have any pity for the man who killed Sherlock. 

It takes Joan a year, an entire year to see Sherlock alive again. By that time, she has lost any hope to see her friend alive again. And then, one night she goes to Molly's and Sherlock opens the door. She says "Hello Joan" with this careful look in her eyes and Joan tries to resist, she really tries (okay, not really). After a second, she has her arms wrapped around Sherlock's middles, hugging her as tight as she can. Then, when Sherlock relaxes, she bites her. Hard. Sherlock yelps, taking a step back and massaging his shoulder, while Joan turn up her nose at the taste of wool in her mouth. Molly is giggling helplessly at the two of them.  
Joan sighs, looks at Sherlock and says "Welcome back". She chokes on the words just a bit, but Sherlock is hugging her again so it doesn't really matter.


End file.
